Текст книги "My Soul to Keep"

Автор книги: Kennedy Ryan

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Текущая страница: 21 (всего у книги 23 страниц)

IVAN GORSHKOV, HIGHLY RESPECTED RUSSIAN PIANO instructor, hated me. I knew it right away. He resented that there was so little he could teach a nine-year-old. He would rap my knuckles with a bamboo wand for minor mistakes. He’d set this metronome on the piano facing me. It ran constantly for the hours I studied with him. This perennial, steady, annoying tick.

In some twisted, Pavlovian way, that metronome is the sound of my fury. I’ve only experienced it a few times in my life, but when I’m enraged, that steady tick is in my head. It’s my pulse. It’s the aural expression of my rage. It’s ticking in my chest like a bomb, primed to detonate. And God help anyone in my vicinity.

Thank God Kai left. I couldn’t focus with her here. The thought of that vermin trespassing inside my girl has my stomach heaving. For him, that piece of shit, to have ever even touched her with those lying lips, to have had his mouth, his fingers near her, inside her. I’m tortured imagining the positions he had her in. If he took her from behind. If he came inside of her.

I’m a storm in motion. Thunder rumbles under my skin. Lightning strikes behind my eyes. I rush past the studios and down the halls, the metronome in my head marking my steps. Tick fucking tock. I don’t even want to check this fury. I want to unleash it gale-force on that shitbag.

When I reach the Birch studio, I barely take note of the producer, the engineer, the singer at the board. My eyes zero in on the booth where Drex stands behind the glass and at the microphone, eyes closed and listening back to a track in the headphones.

“I need the room.” My hoarse voice barges into their conversation.

“What?” The singer Drex is collaborating with stands from his seat at the soundboard. “We paid for this session, Gray. What do you mean you need the room?”

“Session’s on me.” I’m struggling to contain my anger long enough to get witnesses out of here. “And I’ll throw in another for free.”

“You’ll throw in another?” The singer asks. “What do you mean?”

“I’m part owner of Wood.” I deliberately slow my words. “And I need the room. It won’t take long. Fifteen minutes tops I need with Drex.”

Understanding dawns on their faces. The enmity between Drex and me is well-documented in our circles. One by one they stand and drift off.

“This is between you and Drex,” the singer says before he walks out the door. “But when I come back in fifteen minutes, I need him still able to sing. We’re finishing this song tonight.”

I nod, but who knows what will happen?

I walk into the booth and close the door.

Drex opens his eyes, sliding the headphones off his head and around his neck. I don’t have anything to say to him yet. Instead, I slam him against the soundproofed wall, manacling his wrists in one hand and wrapping the wires around his neck with the other, pulling them taut. Red invades his face, and his eyes stretch until I think they may pop out of his head. I want them to pop out of his head. I tighten the wires more, drawing his ears closer to my lips so I can whisper to him.

“Do I have your attention, you loathsome piece of shit?”

He can’t speak. His oxygen is choked off. He sputters.

“Nod.”

He does, frantically.

“You probably think I’m going to say that if you ever touch her again, I’ll destroy you, right?” I hiss into his reddened ear. “That’s what you’ve heard, isn’t it? That when people cross me, I make them pay because I have influence in this town. Is that what you’ve heard?”

He nods and whimpers.

“In your pathetic mind, you probably think your career is tanked because of something I’ve done. Some strings I’ve pulled. Nope. You’re just a low-rate, mediocre no-talent. I didn’t have to lift a finger to ruin your career. You do that just by sucking.”

He jerks at me, like he can do something, but he can’t

“That’s not what I’m here to tell you, fucker.” Anger makes me pant. Makes me sweat. “I’m here to tell you—now listen close to this part because I’m not ever saying it again—I’m here to tell you that if you ever touch her again, come near her again, or even talk about her to anyone, I’ll kill you.”

I pull back to peer into his panic-stretched eyes.

“Kill. Dead. Not metaphorical. Do you understand?”

The booth door flies open, and Marlon rushes in, pulling me off the douchebag. Drex slides down the wall to land on his ass, hauling in air like his life depends on it, clutching his neck.

“What are you doing?” Marlon shoves at my chest. “You’re trippin’! You can’t just go around—”

“I can. I just did.” I jerk back and stare at Drex. “Don’t forget what I said, motherfucker.”

And I’m out. I hear Drex hurling obscenities and empty threats at my back. Thinking I give a fuck. The thought of that lizard having sex with my girl is a buzz saw right down the center of my brain, but that isn’t the worst part. The worst part is he knows, everybody knows, I’ve never bothered committing to anyone. I haven’t been serious about anyone since Petra, and that was high school. When I went public with Kai, I had no idea what he had against me. Against her. Any scruples he has, he sets aside to get at me. I’ve seen it before. And for him to know how much Kai means to me, to know he slept with her, it doesn’t just anger and disgust me, it flat out petrifies me. How will he use this against her to get at me?

I climb behind the wheel, phone to my ear.

“Gep, she still with you?”

“No, she went home.”

“Good. I’m on my way there now.”

The silence on the other end feels off.

“Gep, what?”

“Not your place. She went back to her apartment.”

I should have seen that coming, but it still jolts my heart. I turn the SUV around and head for her place.

“How was she?”

“Not good. Maybe you should, you know . . .”

“Don’t say give her some space. That shit’s not happening.”

I hang up before he can bestow more of his sage relationship advice on me. When I pull into the parking lot of Kai’s apartment, I don’t know why I’m surprised to see a few paps camped out.

My damn life.

Oh, well. They might just get a show because there’s no way I’m letting this go tonight.

One of them approaches me, shutters snapping.

“Did you and Kai have a fight? She looked upset when she got home.”

I ignore him, stabbing the doorbell.

“Rhyson, how do you feel about Kai living with another man?”

“Can you address rumors that she’s also seeing Dub Shaughnessy?”

I’m about two seconds from shoving that camera up a very dark hole in that little gremlin’s body if he doesn’t back off me.

The door cracks open, chain on, to reveal a sliver of San’s face. He doesn’t look happy to see me. I’m not happy to see him either.

“I need to come in.”

“I don’t think so.” He slits his eyes at me. “Maybe tomorrow.”

“Tonight. Now. Open the door, San.” I glance over my shoulder. “I really don’t want to give these carnies a freak show, but I will.”

“What did you do to make her cry?”

Something as hot as acid burns my throat at even the thought of her tears, but I gulp it back.

“Nothing,” I lie. “I didn’t do anything. It’s a misunderstanding. Let me in so we can talk about it.”

“Rhyson, dammit.”

“I love her.” I trap his eyes through the tiny space the chain allows, not even caring if the reporters behind me hear. “You know I do. I’d never hurt her.”

He bangs his forehead against the door three times before slipping the chain off and cracking the door open just enough for me to slip in. I hear cameras snapping behind me.

“They always out there like that?” I glance around the small space where I’d courted Kai for months. I’d never really thought of it that way, but that’s what it was. Courtship. Taking time to win her. Best investment of my time ever.

“Not always.” San shrugs. “I think they saw her in that bodyguard’s SUV and probably thought you were with her.”

“I don’t like her here anymore. It’s not secure enough.”

“Seems to me you’re the greatest danger to her.” San frowns at me. “Before I let you see her—”

“Oh, you’re on one if you think you’re letting me see her.” I brush past him, but he grabs my arm. “Dude, let go.”

“That girl back there is the best friend I have in the world.” San tightens his fingers around my arm. “We’ve been through everything together. I’ve seen her when her dad left and when her mom died. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen her cry like she’s crying in there now, so yeah, I’ll be deciding if you get to see her.”

That I can respect. I can appreciate someone who cares about her that way.

“Drex Martin was at the studio tonight.”

San’s response says it all. Damn Kai and her secrets.

“Yeah, I see you already know what that means. He couldn’t wait to tell me about the two of them. I needed to handle him first, and I think she thought I . . . I didn’t make it clear. I’m an asshole.”

San nods, slowly releasing my arm.

“She was in a dark place that night.”

“Don’t tell me.” I shake my head. “I don’t wanna know. I don’t ever wanna know.”

“Well, I’m not going anywhere. I’m not leaving her.”

“That’s fine.” I shrug. “You might hear a lot of yelling and screaming and shit. Who knows what it will take to make up with her? For sure, you’re gonna hear us fucking like animals before the night’s out. If that’s how you get your rocks off, stick around.”

San nods slowly, lips twisting sideways. He slides his hands into his front pockets. Upon further consideration, he grabs his backpack from a nearby table. He turns at the door.

“I’ll lock up on my way out.”

“You do that.”

His prerogative, of course.

I’m surprised when the doorknob to Kai’s room turns under my hand, and the door swings open. The room is completely dark. Sobs come from the small, shaking lump on the bed, the sound paring away the protective layers of my heart until, even though I’m not crying, I’m as vulnerable as she is. I measure my steps over to the bed. She’s sobbing so hard she doesn’t realize I’m approaching, or maybe she does.

“San, go away,” she mumbles into her pillow. “Please, just leave me alone for a little while.”

I touch her back and caress her hair.

“Pep, it’s me.”

She goes stiff, but doesn’t sit up. If anything she burrows deeper into the pillow.

“Rhyson, go. Oh, God, why are you here?” Her voice breaks so badly I can barely understand her. “Just go. I don’t want to see you.”

I stretch to the table beside her bed, flick on the lamp, and reach back to gently turn her over. I don’t know who I want to kill more, Drex or myself, for doing this to her. Her beautiful face is mottled red. Those eyes that seduce me without even trying are swollen almost shut.

“I’m a mess,” she whispers, covering her face. “Don’t look at me.”

“Oh, I’m looking at you.” My throat is so sore with the emotions I’m holding back, I couldn’t sing now if my life depended on it. “I haven’t been able to stop looking at you since you walked into Grady’s music room that first night.”

She folds her body in half, pressing her face to her knees.

“I wanted to tell you, Rhyson, but I was so scared I’d lose you.” Tears mangle her words. She sniffs, but it doesn’t help. “It was my mom’s first birthday since the funeral, and after the shoot, Drex invited me out for drinks. I . . . I was so lonely and desperate to just feel.”

“I don’t want to know this, Pep.” I wish I was big enough to let her get this off her chest, but the more details I know about that piece of shit fucking my girl, the worse it will be.

“But . . . I don’t even remember it, Rhyson.” She closes her eyes tightly, bottom lip trapped between her teeth. “I remember him taking me to his place, and then—”

“Pep.” I place my index finger over her soft lips, shaking my head. “I can’t. I don’t ever want to know. Those images in my head would be too much. I can get past this because I don’t know anything. Hearing the details, seeing it in my head, I don’t know what that would do.”

Tears stream down her cheek, and she covers her face with both hands.

“The one person you hate more than anyone, and I . . . and I . . .”

“Baby, listen to me.” My arms literally ache from not holding her. I slide to the top of her bed, back against the headboard and pull her beside me, tucking her head into my shoulder. “It’s shit luck. That’s all. It’s like the universe played the worst trick on us it possibly could. I hate Drex, and the thought of him . . .”

The words die in my mouth, poisoned by a toxic mix of nausea, fury, and disgust. I’ll block even the thought of it.

“You’re the one thing I can’t give up. I’ve been hooked on Xanax. That was bad, but Grady sent me to rehab, and I kicked that habit.”

I pull back to look into her teary, bloodshot eyes.

“There’s no kicking you,” I say hoarsely. “You’re in my veins. In my blood. In my bones, and I just want you deeper. I want you so close that nothing and no one, certainly not that douchebag, could ever come between us.”

“I thought you would never want me again.” Her mouth wobbles. Tears course over her flushed cheeks. “I thought you couldn’t look at me. That you were disgusted by me now that you knew I had been with him.”

Not want her? Hell, I’m hard as ice right now with her this close.

I press her hand to my cock so she can feel for herself. So she can know that nothing has changed between our hearts or our bodies. Her eyes meet mine, wide and wet and dark. Without looking away, she rolls her hand up and down on me. I stiffen in my jeans under her fingers to the point of pain. My head falls against hers.

“Yeah, Pep, that’s it,” I husk into her hair.

Her pull goes faster, harder, and I’ll be damned if I’m coming in my pants after a night like this. I pull her hand away, my hands trembling to get my zipper down and my pants and boxers over my legs. She’s just as urgent, slipping her jeans and panties off, positioning her knees on either side of me on the bed, poised above me. I reach down to my jeans pocket for a condom, but she grabs my wrist, and shakes her head, eyes steady and hot on mine.

“I took care of it.”

She slides onto me, tight and creamy. I’ve never done this. Not one time in my life have I been inside a girl raw. The hot, liquid slide of flesh on flesh is addictive and intoxicating, like her pussy is lined with liquor. The ride starts slow, our eyes connected as she eases up and pushes down. But the pace builds from steady to frantic, so vigorous her small breasts bounce. I grip her hips and take one breast into my mouth, suckling the nipple until it swells hard. She moans and throws her head back, bracing one hand on my shoulder. I fall back onto the bed, and she keeps riding me, lording over me like a goddess. I reach up and palm her breasts. I pump up into her, and her mouth falls open with short, hot breaths.

“Harder, Rhys,” she pants. “I need . . .”

I know what she needs. I pull out and flip her onto her knees, positioned behind her on the bed, entering in one strong stroke. I’m in so deep she screams. I want to scream too. She milks me, grips me like a fist, clutches me.

Did he have her like this?

The thought intrudes on this intimate moment like a searchlight, harsh and bright. I won’t let him do this. I won’t let him spoil this for me. He won’t spoil her for me. I push deeper, ramming my hips against her ass. It’s mine. Reaching around to squeeze her breasts. They’re mine. I slide my fingers down the sleek plane of her belly and plunge my fingers between those thick, wet lips. They’re mine. I pinch her clit. It’s mine.

Every time I mark a piece of flesh, she cries out. She’s jerking beneath me, weeping. I don’t know if it’s the intensity of the pleasure, or relief that we still have this, still have each other despite how Drex tried to break us, but I understand her tears because emotion swells in my chest.

I will die if I don’t come soon, but I want to come looking into her eyes. I pull out again and lay her on her back, spreading her for me. I only take time to glance at the strong dancer’s legs dropped open and the subtle line of muscles in her stomach, the pink lips between her thighs, dripping for me, before I plunge back in. I capture her eyes and grip her thigh. I trace up her waist and over her breast and up her arm until I reach her hand, marrying our fingers.

There’s no barrier, nothing between our bodies. Nothing between our souls. The house could be on fire, maybe it is, but I can’t look away from her. Tears roll down her cheeks and into the corners of her mouth, down her neck. I bend, licking the path of her tears, groaning when the salty taste of her love bursts on my tongue.

Her breasts press into my chest. Our bellies kiss. I push in as deep as I can, seeking out every secret her body would withhold. I must know it all. Her head jerks back, the velvety skin of her neck stretched and exposed. Her body’s spasms ricochet through me.

I don’t even try to squelch her screams. I don’t care if the paps outside hear it and record it and it goes viral. It’s my name, dammit, ripping a hole in the quiet. My name claiming the air around her. She’s my girl. And I am so completely fucking hers. Because all the while I’ve been claiming her, she’s been claiming me. Her hands gripping my ass, running over my chest, clutching my shoulders. With just touch, we’ve discovered a new intimacy. A path sprang up that no one but us can follow, taking us to a place that no one else can find. And there, with only our hearts as witnesses, our bodies make a vow that our souls will keep.

I’M NOT VERY GOOD AT FAKING casual. From very early on, my pace was almost frenetic. Between shows and tours and lessons and special appearances, I got used to a kinetic lifestyle. It was only when I went to live with Grady that I learned to appreciate kicking it. Playing video games. Riding dune buggies. Surfing at the beach. Still sometimes, it doesn’t come naturally to me. Especially when I have a performance or an audition.

I haven’t had an audition in years, but Kai auditions for Total Package today. And pretending I don’t care is wearing my ass out. I’m on the couch in the rec room, reading some magazine. Some GQ shit that Marlon left the last time he was here, which should tip her off right away because me reading GQ? Like that’s happening. She’s too nervous to notice though. She shouldn’t be. They’ll want her. I know they will.

That first time I saw her teaching her dance class, saw the command she had of every movement, I knew she was a star. The night we sang together at her church in Glory Falls Baptist, and I heard that unique husky purity of her voice, I knew she was a star. And looking at her now, eyes smoky, lashes long with mascara, mouth a vivid red, wearing leather leggings and this tiny top that shows those muscles in her stomach, that sexy belly ring, and the elegant script of a prayer tattooed across her ribs—yeah, they’ll know she’s a star too.

The question isn’t will they want her. The question is will I let them have her. I want her for Prodigy. She thought I was being benevolent when I offered her a spot on my label. When it comes to business, especially music business, I’m all business. If I didn’t think she would blow the top off this industry, I wouldn’t have offered her a deal. I believe in her. The only thing that runs deeper than my unequivocal belief in her, is my determination to protect her. There are sharks out there, and John Malcolm has the sharpest teeth.

“How do I look?” She bites her bottom lip, glancing down her body and pushing back her hair.

What amazes me about Kai is that she’s really asking. Other girls would be fishing for compliments. Don’t get me wrong. Kai understands her attraction, but there isn’t a vain bone in that petite body. How that happened, I don’t know. Yet one more thing her mom did right raising her.

“You look great,” I understate. “You nervous?”

“So nervous.” She walks over to me, nudging my legs apart to stand between them and slide onto my lap, lying against my chest. “What if I mess this up? This is the kind of shot I’ve been working for all my life.”

I toss the magazine to the floor and pull her hair away from her neck, planting a kiss there. I push her shoulder back gently until I can tip up her chin and force her to look at me.

“Baby, you are inevitable.”

Her eyes soften and smile back at me.

“Rhyson, that is the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“I mean it. If for some reason these idiots don’t see it, the next ones will. Or the next ones after that, but you are too talented to go unnoticed.”

“I don’t deserve you.” She leans forward to kiss me quickly before popping up and off my lap. “I’ll be late.”

“Is Gep taking you?” I ask, frowning.

“Yeah, he’s waiting out front.” She strides to the door, high-heeled boots clacking on the floor. “I live you.”

I chuckle at our private joke about her damn autocorrected text.

“I live you, too.”

As soon as I hear the front door close behind her, I’m galvanized, off the couch and dialing Marlon on my cell.

“Okay, I’m ready. Come get me.”

Fifteen minutes later, I’m ducking down in the backseat of a rusting Honda Civic with a pizza delivery sign on the roof. Marlon, dreads spilling from beneath a baseball cap, drives through the gates of my neighborhood and past the unsuspecting paps.

“This is stupid,” Marlon says from the front seat.

“I’m just playing it safe.”

“You’re playing it stupid.” He glances back at me.

“Don’t look back here.”

“What exactly do you hope to gain by seeing her audition?”

“I just need to see what happens. I want to be there for her, but I don’t want to make her nervous.”

It’s quiet in the car for a minute, and I’m just about to ask him to turn on the radio when he speaks. Quietly, but he speaks.

“Like, you really love her, don’t you?”

How do I answer honestly without sounding like a pussy?

“You could take away my Grammys and the money and the fame, everything I have, and if you told me I could still keep her, I’d be fine with that.”

How’d I do?

“Damn, you are pussy whipped,” Marlon sniggers. “I mean, I like your sister and all, but gimme some Grammys.”

“What you feel for Bristol is all below the belt, Marlon. I wouldn’t put it in the same category as my relationship with Kai.”

“Hey, you’re talking to the unfortunate, scarred soul who walked in on the two of you banging on the piano bench last week, so you’re not all above belt yourself.”

“Okay, that was . . . awkward, but you know what I mean.”

“So you don’t care that Drex tapped that?”

To even hear him talk about her with Drex that way claws at my reason. Even him being my best friend, I want to leap over the backseat and scrape his skin off. I hate that he even knows. I don’t want anyone to know. I actually can’t believe Drex hasn’t told anyone yet, hasn’t exploited the information for his purposes. Unless he took me seriously when I had that cord wrapped around his neck

Which he should have.

“She’s mine.” I say it quietly and with fierce certainty. “It doesn’t matter who came before me. No one else is coming after me.”

“Not ever?”

He’s asking if I want to marry Kai. I want to lovingly chain her to me any way I can. Legally, sexually. I want her wearing my rings. I want her having my babies. Anything that welds us together is fine with me. I know she’s not ready for that, and there’s no rush. She wants to get her career off the ground, and I respect that. We can go at this pace, as long as we’re going together.

“I said, not ever, Rhyson?”

“I heard you.” I peer over the seat, looking into the backlot where Total Package records. “Look. We’re here.”

I grab my trusty disguise, the pervy moustache, a thrift shop hat and coat, slipping it over my jeans.

“All you’re missing is the white kidnapper van.” Marlon gestures to my top lip. “Total creeper.”

“Hey, it does the job. Let’s find Luke. He’s my hook up.”

Luke has me set up backstage, behind a curtain, stage right. I have a clear line of vision to Kai, pacing directly across from me, backstage left. She’s chewing on her thumbnail and biting one side of her pouty bottom lip.

I don’t know how to feel. On the one hand, of course I want her to do well. On the other, these guys not only don’t deserve her, I’m not sure they’ll know what to do with her, how to best showcase her talent. Maybe it’s arrogant to think I do, but I know her and I know music. I love her and I love music.

“Ms. Pearson, we’re ready for you,” one of the producers down front calls.

Kai draws a deep breath and then does something that makes me want to throw her over my shoulder and drag her out of here in Marlon’s borrowed rusty Civic. She lifts the nameplate necklace I gave her for Christmas and kisses it, eyes closed tight.

I’ve purposefully avoided her rehearsals, but I’ve heard her doing compression exercises, working on her tone, and stretching her range. It’s paid off. No one would accuse her of being a dancer who sings. She’s a great vocalist. Grady’s been coaching her for this audition. He’s done a great job preparing her, but he had nothing to do with what arrests me, and I’m sure the producers, almost from the moment she steps onto the stage.

All signs of uncertainty, tentativeness, dissipate. Even tiny, barely clearing five feet, she commands the stage from the first step, her wide smile and easy confidence creating a force field around her that nerves and jitters can’t penetrate. She speaks into the mic, her Southern drawl sweetening the air.

“How y’all doing?”

No different than the night we sang a Christmas carol at Glory Falls Baptist for a roomful of people she’d known all her life. As bright and genuine and magnetic.

She gives the nod to the engineer running sound. I know she’s using a track. I would have probably advised her to go live and pared down for the audition because the song is so produced, maybe a simple piano or acoustic arrangement, but as soon as she starts, I understand why she made this choice. She needed the full instrumentation and the background vocals as the base from which she can spring. The bass and grit of the original arrangement allow her to showcase not only her vocal abilities, but in a subtle way, the fluid athleticism of her body. She starts center, but doesn’t stay there long, moving from one end of the stage to the other. Kai can be reserved, but the spunk and fire and energy I get to see when it’s just the two of us, she pours into this performance.

When I suggested the song, I knew it would highlight her vocal ability. When it soars, she can stretch into her range, full-voiced and rich. When it ebbs, she showcases the control and discipline of her vocal instrument. I didn’t realize though, how well it fit her story, her journey. Truth sets every lyric ablaze. When she sings about it being worth the wait and says we haven’t seen the best of her, we know it’s true. We know it’s only a matter of time.

As a professional, I can dissect all the technical things she executes beautifully that make the performance work. Yet, as someone who is seeing her sing and move and emit this riveting stage presence—the whole package onstage really for the first time—I’m awed that I’ve been friends with this girl, been dating this girl, sleeping with this amazing star right under my nose this whole time and had no idea. No fucking idea that she is literally going to jettison past everyone else and explode into the cultural landscape like a meteor.

Me included.

Her last note uncorks applause from the producers. I can’t easily see them from my position, but if I were them, I’d be on my feet. Kai grins, obviously a little overwhelmed by the response, pressing her hand to her forehead and then her chest. Then her stomach. I know that feeling after you’ve given everything, drained your gift for an audience. You don’t know what to do with yourself sometimes when you stop. Nothing else feels as natural as pouring yourself out for them. When you stop, you wonder what else they want, what else you could give.

Luke pulls my arm, jarring me out of the moment.

“You need to get out of here.” He smiles at the few stagehands milling around. “This is a closed audition. It’s a miracle I got you in here. And a bigger miracle that no one has recognized you yet. Let’s go.”

He’s right. I should go. Kai would probably think I’m interfering. She’d be right. I hoped seeing her audition would make my decision easier, my way clearer, but things are murkier now than they were before. Either way I go, I’m afraid she’ll end up hurt. One way, the hurt I control. I inflict. The other, someone else does. When she’s cut, I bleed, so it’s not much of a choice at all.